The Baseball HOF is again working with Massachusetts-based Sports Travel & Tours, its longtime official travel partner, in preparation for what should be this July one of its highest-attended induction ceremonies. The HOF earlier today in N.Y. formally introduced the '15 class of players elected by the BBWAA: Craig Biggio, Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez and John Smoltz. The museum is projecting a turnout at least resembling last year's figure of more than 48,000, the third largest such draw ever for the event and highest since '07. Sports Travel & Tours in particular is targeting groups in the HOF's key attendance draws of N.Y. and Boston. Those markets are involved in the careers of Johnson and Martinez, and Biggio hails from Long Island.
"Last year, with the six inductees, gave us a pretty good template of what to expect this time," said HOF President Jeff Idelson. "These are players with universal appeal that touch a lot of markets." This year's induction class also extends a marked reversal from a relatively fallow period of inductions that ebbed in '13, when no living inductees were honored and the event drew just 2,000 people. "You look ahead to the upcoming ballots, the likely scenarios, and the induction pipeline looks rather strong all the way through Derek Jeter (expected to be enshrined in 2020)," Idelson said.
